we are quite old, and the fra transfer is a horror to us(fra is a horror to us). we want to travel in biz from iAd to ams. the saving with a transfer in either YYz(toronto) or dub(dublin) cuts the price by about 40%($2900 vs $4800). which is the better flight and transfer for us?

aer lingus through dubin, or air canada through toronto?? if the distances for transfer are over half a mile(20 min walk) would need transfer service.

the short piece of each (iAd/yyz or dub/ams ) is in a narrow body. not a problem for short distance.

Terminal 2 at DUB (which Aer Lingus uses) is much smaller than YYZ so, depending upon which gates are used, it is likely that your walking in Dublin will be less than in Toronto. T2 is a nice modern facility and I enjoy transferring there.

Having said that, I find AC in Business is a good airline - I've not tried Aer Lingus, but I gather that they don't yet have many seats that are lie-flat.

I am pretty sure that Aer Lingus doesn't fly to IAD directly, DUB-IAD is a UA flight on a 757 if I remember correctly. Aer Lingus would fly the short DUB-AMS part of the itinerary and there's no business class on their European flights.

Aer Lingus started flying to IAD last month, with their new business class, which looks nicer than AC. However, last time I looked, their departure from IAD was around half 5/6. BA fly to IAD, not sure about KLM. I think Air France fly to IAD, so you have a few to choose from

Even when there is, there isn't much (if any) extra legroom, though you are usually guaranteed a window or aisle seat with a free middle.

I wouldn't be too put off by having to fly down the back on a short hop, when the alternative is no better.

One other thing you might like to consider is the traveling times - because Dublin is further west, flights there tend to be very short and arrive very early.

I would always start an eastbound TATL as late as possible to get a good sleep and adapt to jetlag more quickly. In addition, you'll feel much more alert if you transfer before you're jetlagged rather than afterward.

Without being able to say how much more difficult the YYZ transfer might be, the schedule on that route (and potentially the hard product) will be better.

Nice catch, I had forgotten that. It's a slightly odd route for EI to be honest.

is it? I thought captial cities had a lot of flights

Well, their other routes are places like NYC, Boston, Chicago i.e. Irish-American strongholds with a lot of recent Irish migrants as well with San Francisco thrown in as a nod to the Silicon Valley corporate presence in Ireland.

Washington doesn't fit in there. I don't even get the sense the UA flight is *huge* or else it would be a 777 rather than a 757. So you add 4 weekly flights in the summer i.e. when government travel is at its lowest ebb. Dunno, who is it aimed at?

It's aimed at passengers traveling to Europe.

You can always go through Istanbul

True, but BA have an a380 on the IAD route, and the 777 flights i've been on have been quite full

delete. i don't know how to read usair offerings.

Also check Brussels - An easy train ride to AMS.

Not sure that they'd want to fly to Brussels and take a train if they claim to be old.

Have you considered that United and KLM fly nonstop from IAD-AMS?

Have a great trip!

My understanding of the OP's first post is that the nonstops are significantly more expensive than the one-stops through Dublin or Toronto, hence the desire to fly the one-stops in the first place, so it seems that they did consider the nonstops and rejected them as too costly.